And I can’t crank out the Excel sheets at home. If it weren’t for my job at Real Change, I’d have nothing but old age Social Security, which, given that I only worked 12 years of my adult life in salary and wage jobs that paid into FICA, wouldn’t pay enough for me to live off cat food.īut this week one of my co-workers tested positive for COVID-19, so I need to ensure I don’t have it before coming back to the office. I fill out a timesheet accounting for every piddly hour and half-hour, also on an Excel document, print it out, and they pay me by the hour mainly for my little Excel productions and for keeping my desk free of cobwebs. I hide in a back room hunched over a computer, feeding facts and numbers, names and dates, into pre-molded Excel receptacles. I run a one-man assembly line that cranks out Excel documents. When not writing these columns for absolutely no pay at all, I’m working for pay in the Vendor Program at Real Change. It’s a secret I’ve hidden from the public for years. I hear you all saying, in unison, “You? Work? You toil away at a job?” Still, I’m getting a short vacation from work thanks to COVID-19. I’m old, so I’ve been fully vaccinated since February. President Joe Biden is out to get everyone in the country vaccinated for COVID-19.
